Naoya Masuda

I'm a little late getting to this since I was out of town for a bit but on August 4th, Naoya Masuda of the Chiba Lotte Marines became the latest member of the Meikyukai or "Golden Players Club" when he notched his 250th save.  Masuda was reported in the press as the "first reliever born in the Heisei Era to make the Meikyukai" which is kind of silly as he's only the second Heisei-born member of the club (after Hideto Asamura).  He's likely to be joined soon by Raidel Martinez (243 saves) and Yasuaki Yamasaki (246 saves). 

Masuda was the Marines' fourth (and last) pick in the 2011 draft out of Kansai International University.  He was an integral part of Lotte's bullpen in 2012, making 72 appearances with a 2-2 record, 41 holds, 1 save and a 1.67 ERA.  He set records for most appearances and most holds in a season by a rookie and was selected as the Pacific League Rookie Of The Year.  He became the team's closer in 2013 and led the PL in saves with 33 but injuries and ineffectiveness caused him to lose and gain the closer role several times over the next few seasons.  It won't be until 2019 that he regained the role for "good" (or at least until last year) and he put up six straight seasons of at least 25 saves, including a league leading 38 in 2021.  He was only seven away from 250 saves before last season but injuries and ineffectiveness again caused him to lose the closing role and he ended the season with only 248 saves.  He worked hard this past off season to get back into shape but Rikuto Yokoyama was pitching well as the closer and save opportunities for the now setup man were hard to come by.  He got save #249 on June 10th but it would take another six weeks or so to get #250.  (H/T Thomas Love Seagull for the details about the past two seasons)

It took Masuda 795 appearances to reach 250 saves, the most of any pitcher in history.  He's also the only one to do it without having at least one start.  He's been a five time All Star (2012-13, 2016, 2021-22).  I'm a bit surprised that the only time he's suited up for Samurai Japan was for the squad that played against Taiwan in November of 2013 (which actually was the first time the National Team was called "Samurai Japan").

Masuda's first baseball card was #045 from the 2012 BBM Rookie Edition set.  He had additional rookie cards in BBM's 1st Version (#162), 2nd Version (#540), Marines (#M32), All Star (#A16) and Genesis (#CB053 from the Cross Blaze subset) sets as well as Calbee's Series Three (#179), Bandai's Owners League 03 (#064) and Konami's Baseball Heroes Black (#B12RB129) sets.  Here's a handful of his cards from over the years - I'll confess that it was somewhat difficult to find cards with interesting photos of him:

2012 BBM Rookie Edition #045

2012 BBM 1st Version #162

2012 Calbee Series Three #179

2013 BBM 1st Version #328

2016 BBM Marines #M29

2018 Epoch NPB #194

2018 BBM 2nd Version #352

2021 Calbee Series One #012

2021 BBM Fusion #TH19

2023 BBM 1st Version #118

2025 Epoch NPB #167

I'm guessing from looking at all his baseball cards that he started using the blue glove in 2018.  The earliest card I've seen with it is his 2018 BBM 2nd Version card that I shared above.